Love Is the Chassis of Faith: Letting God's Word Prevail

Sermon outline

God's Word is alive and anointed, and when you walk in love, practise giving and believe it, the Word grows in you and prevails over every situation.

1. The Word of God is Christ to you, and it is anointed

   Jesus is the Word, so when you read and study the Bible you are having communion with Christ; it is not just a book. The anointing is in the Word and increases as you study it, and God watches over His Word to perform it, so it cannot fail.

   “When you read the word, you are having communion with Christ.”

   • John 1:1
   • Jeremiah 1:12

2. Most problems are a Word problem

   Christians' problems are usually not their circumstances but a Word issue: they want others to teach and live the Word for them. Take the Word like medicine: write down scriptures on your need, meditate on them, confess them, pray them and walk in them. God is specific and accurate, and His principles and laws yield results when you work them.

   Illustration: For a financial challenge, take four, five or ten scriptures on finances, write them down and meditate on them until you are living them.

   “The problem that Christians are faced with is a word problem.”

3. Faith works by love

   Loving one another is a commandment, not an option, yet many choose unforgiveness and love only some. A love failure cripples the faith walk. Love comes by practice: difficult the first time, easier the next, until you forgive people before they even offend you.

   Illustration: He says most people's faith suffers with arthritis because they have failed to walk, speak and communicate in love.

   “Many people in the kingdom of God have faith failure because they have a love failure.”

   • John 13:34
   • Galatians 5:6

4. Practise your giving

   Freely you have received, freely give: there is no place for a miser or a stingy person in the kingdom. Nobody is a born giver, as children fighting over toys show, so you must start where you are, be faithful and keep growing in giving, love and witnessing.

   Illustration: Little children who will not share their toys, with mum and dad running in as referees.

   “The only way to practise giving is to give.”

   • Matthew 10:8
   • Acts 20:35

5. So mightily grew the Word of God and prevailed

   At Ephesus it was not Paul's preaching ability, philosophy or qualifications that prevailed but the anointed Word, which went where men could not go and took hold of people's hearts. Love undergirds the faith life like a chassis, faith is the body, and the anointing gives it wheels; if one is missing, you will say the right words and nothing will happen.

   Illustration: A car: love is the chassis the whole body rests on, faith is the body that beautifies it, and the anointing is the wheels that propel it.

   “So your love walk is the chassis of your faith life.”

   • Acts 19:20

6. The Word grew and multiplied

   The Word is alive, so it grows, and it works for you even while you sleep, like seed in a garden. Rest from fights that are not yours, and don't make the doctor's report your god. Be careful what and how you hear, and feed on the Word until it gains the ascendancy in your mind and dominates every contrary report.

   Illustration: A story he heard from a man of God about a woman who had half her womb removed, believed for a baby at an altar call, was told by her gynaecologist she needed a psychiatrist, and later brought the baby back to show him.

   “Your money will fail. Your academic qualifications will fail. The word of God will prevail.”

   • Acts 12:24
   • Hebrews 4:12
   • Mark 4:26-27
   • 1 Timothy 6:12
   • Mark 4:24
   • Luke 8:18
   • 1 Corinthians 2:14

7. What manner of man is this? Speak the Word and things listen

   Jesus spoke only what the Father told Him, so when He rebuked the wind and the sea they obeyed, and that same ability has been given to believers. Money, sickness and promotion will listen to the Word; only doubt and unbelief can nullify it. Refuse to be a cross, offended person controlled by others, choose to speak life, and let the Word prevail in your home, business and profession.

   Illustration: An 82-year-old retired doctor turned missionary, full of joy at a conference, who prayed over her only can of beans and kept dishing out for twelve guests.

   “There is nothing that the word of God cannot dominate.”

   • Matthew 8:23-27
   • John 12:49-50
   • Philippians 2:10
   • Ephesians 6:13
   • John 7:38
   • Proverbs 18:21
   • Acts 10:34